This study examined whether compromised emotional clarity prospectively contributes to maladaptive social behavior (aggression, anxious solitude) and adverse social experiences (low social status, victimization) in early adolescence; gender differences in these effects also were explored. Youth (N = 636, [x-bar] age = 10.94, SD = 0.37) completed a…

This study focused on early adolescents' stress of language brokering and examined the moderating role of family cumulative risk in the relation of language brokering to adjustment problems. Data came from self-reports of 604 low-income Mexican American adolescent language brokers (54% female; X[bar] [subscript age]= 12.4; SD = 0.97; 75% born in…

This study examined the distinctiveness of and the correlates associated with anxious-withdrawal and unsociability during early adolescence in Finland (N = 384; 12-14 years; 53% girls). As expected, confirmatory factor analyses revealed that anxious-withdrawal and unsociability were distinct and moderately positively correlated constructs. Only…

Close mutual friendships may help protect socially anxious early adolescents against concurrent psychosocial risks. This study investigated whether close mutual friendships moderated associations among social anxiety and several indices of psychosocial maladjustment (loneliness, peer victimization, and low social self-efficacy) in early…

This longitudinal study had three objectives: (a) to identify different profiles of second-year middle school students (Grade 8) in terms of academic, emotional, and social adjustment; (b) to test the contribution of worries at the end of Grade 6 to distinguish these profiles; and (c) to examine the moderating effect of mastery (MG) and…

Two studies investigated the proposition that social achievement goals (different orientations toward social competence) are an important aspect of young adolescents' social motivation. Study 1 (N = 153 6th-grade students) established that different orientations toward developing or demonstrating social competence can be seen in young adolescents'…

With passage of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in 1990, autism was recognized as a distinct special education category. Subsequently, there has been a steady increase in the number of students qualified in the schools to receive special education services under this category. There are a number of questions as to the types of…

Background: Optimism and pessimism are positive and negative expectations linked with well-being in adults. Research on the importance of optimism and pessimism in children is limited by the lack of a developmentally appropriate measure of children's expectations. Method: Based upon the Life Orientation Test-Revised (Scheier, Carver, & Bridges,…